Entering the Maze: Queer Fiction of Krishnagopal Mallick

Krishnagopal Mallick is a literary rarity: sub-editing for an English daily, giving it up to print and publish Bengali little magazines at a press set up at his own home, and then producing essays, short stories, travelogues, memoirs, and novels marked by a dazzling candour and a beguiling lucidity. His words transport us to a North Kolkata of trams, lanes and by-lanes. His unselfconscious prose pulls us into a life lived with honesty and joy. Rarely has Bengali literature witnessed such clear-eyed narratives of public and private violence, sexuality, and humour. These translations introduce to the readers a craftsman of deadpan story-telling who infuses North Kolkata with a queer radiance unmatched in Indian writing. Once one enters the maze of Krishnagopal Mallick, one cannot emerge unmoved, unchanged, unaffected.